
Ontario’s NHL parent club isn’t the only team entering their 2024-25 season with a myriad of new faces. Earlier this week, coach Marco Sturm talked extensively about big-game graduates to the Kings (guys like Alex Turcotte, Andre Lee, and Brandt Clarke), as well holding a team meeting a few days ago with more than a dozen first-year Reign players in the room.
More with Sturm can be found here:
Toyota Arena will host the first three Reign games of this fresh campaign, beginning with a pair this weekend against the visiting San Jose Barracuda. While the Sharks are holding several of the organization’s top prospects up in the NHL — including Will Smith and Macklin Celebrini — their AHL club features one of the top goaltenders in the world who hasn’t cracked an NHL lineup just yet, Yaroslav Askarov.
Based on how things were aligned during practice on Friday, Sturm appears to be leaning toward healthy scratching Kings prospects Kaleb Lawrence and Aatu Jamsen. The process of helping first-year pros graduate from junior hockey and /or various European leagues is something Sturm also dug into during the aforementioned podcast.
To the surprise of nobody paying attention, Erik Portillo — fresh off of signing a new three-year contract extension with the Kings — is targeted as Ontario’s No. 1 goaltender. He led the team with 39 regular season starts in 2023-24 and played in all eight playoff games. His 24 wins were second best in the AHL among all first-year goalies, while his .918 save percentage was fourth best (and sixth best when looking at all goalies, regardless of experience level).
On defense, management still needs to decide what to do with 2023 top draft pick Jakub Dvorak. He’s eligible to play in the AHL or other leagues. We reviewed the Dvorak Dilemma here:
He’s expected to stay with the Reign for at least another month or so before a decision is reached. However, word is, he will sit out Saturday’s season-opener.
REIGN PROJECTED LINEUP vs. BARRACUDA
Projection is based on practice alignment over the past few days. Should Sturm opt to make a few changes during morning skate or pregame warm-ups, this article will be updated.
Malott – Gawdin – Fagemo
Hudon – Studnicka – Chromiak
Madden – Helenius – Ward
Element – Pinelli – Doty
Moverare – Walsh
Booth – Hicketts
Krygier – Rowe
Portillo (starter)
Copley
Other roster options include: (F) Jamesen, Lawrence, Singleton (D) Dvorak, Millar, Parker-Jones
Puck drop is scheduled for 6:00 pm Pacific Time and the game can be viewed on FloHockey.
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